Fantasy Sports: NBA Draft gives many teams a new look

The NBA Draft always provides us with the real-world day that most closely resembles the fantasy-sports realm, but the basketball gods went above and beyond this year.

Fantasy veterans have all been in drafts where we knew who would be the first player selected. If you did not have the top pick, you did not include that premier player in your plans. We have also been in other drafts, however, when there were a few options at the top — a much more exciting endeavor when we wait to see who will fall and become the linchpin we build our team around.

But never have I been at a draft that provided the “Huh?” moment the Cleveland Cavaliers gave us by selecting UNLV freshman Anthony Bennett as the top pick.

Apparently in the hour leading up to the draft, Bennett thought he could have been selected as low as eighth overall. Getting to be the first player to go up and shake David Stern’s hand was like getting a multimillion dollar birthday present then. And having Kyrie Irving to feed passes to him is like then finding a bow around a sports car in the driveway.

(This must have happened in the world at some point and not just in Christmas commercials, no?)

So even if Bennett’s selection was a surprise, it makes sense. Irving is someone the Cavs can build a team around, he improved last season in points (22.5 from 18.5), assists (5.9 from 5.4) and steals (1.5 from 1.1) in his second year and now has another weapon.

So even if Bennett was a surprise decision, in this draft dubbed devoid of superstars, it was not an inconceivable one.

From there, though, conceiving of why some things happened became much more difficult. Maybe it was that lack of superstar talent that drove teams to feel they had to do something, but some impetus drove an amount of dealing that was difficult to follow.

ESPN’s Andy Katz reported that “at least 24 trades were made,” apparently throwing up his hands at that point and realizing close enough was good enough. Those moves included six players who got traded twice, guys who must have also thrown up their hands while telling their families to hold off on booking any flights.

It is another of those fantasy moments we have all seen, the owner who just needs to do something. He has been handed the reins to this team, and he can’t trust it in its current form.

He believes that the only way to make things better is to change it, no matter how convoluted a deal it takes, no matter the amount of players involved and no matter if he potentially mortgages his future.

Somehow all those things come together in the mega-deal that the Celtics and Nets put together on draft night. When all the moving pieces stopped, the trade looked like this (to the best of my ability to understand it): The Celtics sent Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Jason Terry to Brooklyn and in return got Kris Humphries, Gerald Wallace, Kris Joseph, MarShon Brooks, Keith Bogans and first-round draft picks in 2014, 2016 and 2018.

Much like the Cavs’ selection of Bennett made more sense as a piece of a whole, the Nets’ acquisition of the aging Garnett and Pierce makes their lineup impressive. No longer the carry-the-load stars the Celtics needed them to be, the pair will complement guards Deron Williams and Joe Johnson and center Brook Lopez to form one of the best starting units in the NBA.

With all those options, Williams seems a good bet to lead the league in assists. He was fifth in the league last season at 7.7 per game, has had four seasons when he averaged over 10 a game and has lost his biggest potential foe for the crown in the Celtics’ Rajon Rondo.

Not that Rondo isn’t expected to return from his ACL injury, but his options on who to feed with his passes has seriously decreased. Without Pierce and Garnett, his best scoring options are now Jeff Green and the hope that a similarly-coming-back-from-injury Jared Sullinger shows some maturation. I have said a couple times that one needs to look at the whole and not just the pieces, but those guys still don’t make a full puzzle.

The Celtics made a smaller deal on draft night to bring in another potential piece, moving up a few spots to nab Gonzaga’s Kelly Olynyk. Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge called Olynyk “a really good complementary player,” though, so even the team isn’t trying to push him as someone who can fill their recently opened void.

Rondo has shown improvement each year in the NBA (see chart). But now the player whose attitude is rumored to be involved with any move the Celtics make, who is coming off a serious knee injury, who doesn’t know who his new coach will be and who has never been the face of the franchise is being forced to lead a reconstruction project. This does not seem to bode well.

I mean, how many times have you left a fantasy draft with an owner harping over how one guy on their team is ready to bust out and carry him to a championship?

That many. Me, too.

How many times have those predictions come true and resulted in that ultimate level of success?

None. Ouch.

Celtics point guard Rajon Rondo has been treated well by the NBA so far, as the 27-year-old has shown statistical improvement each season. That may become more difficult this year with his gutted squad, however.